Ever since it set the stage for the opening act of the original Star Wars movie, Tatooine has been one of the most beloved and recognizable planets in a galaxy far, far away. From the wretched hive of scum and villainy that is Mos Eisley Spaceport to the Frank Herbert-inspired wasteland of the Dune Sea, Tatooine is an immersive, gorgeously rendered, if desolate Star Wars world.
Throughout the Star Wars saga and continuing into the Disney+ hit series The Mandalorian, Tatooine has been the site of a ton of memorable Star Wars scenes.
C-3PO And R2-D2 Bicker On The Dune Sea
During the opening space battle in the original Star Wars movie, Princess Leia records a message for Obi-Wan onto R2-D2’s hard drive and sends him into an escape pod with C-3PO to find the Jedi on Tatooine and deliver the message.
Artoo and Threepio’s banter on the Dune Sea, inspired by Tahei and Matashichi’s bickering in the opening scenes of Akira Kurosawa’s The Hidden Fortress, instantly immersed audiences in the quirky world of a galaxy far, far away.
Anakin Slaughters The Tusken Raiders Who Kidnapped His Mother
While Revenge of the Sith is often called the darkest Star Wars prequel, there are dark moments in all the prequel movies. In Attack of the Clones, when Anakin returns to Tatooine to check on his mother (against Obi-Wan’s wishes), he learns that she’s been kidnapped by Tusken Raiders.
After Anakin searches the desert and finally finds his mother at a Tusken Raider camp, she dies in his arms. In a blind rage, Anakin slaughters everybody in the camp – not just the men, but the women, and the children, too. It marked the clearest sign yet that Anakin’s turn to the dark side was inevitable.
Ben Kenobi Uses The Jedi Mind Trick
When Ben Kenobi takes Luke Skywalker into the wretched hive of scum and villainy that is Mos Eisley Spaceport, they find a bunch of Stormtroopers looking for their droids. Kenobi is able to convince the Imperial troops that R2-D2 and C-3PO aren’t the droids they’re looking for simply by waving his hand and saying so.
The “Jedi mind trick” quickly became one of the most iconic Force abilities. There’s a hilarious callback in The Phantom Menace in which Qui-Gon tries and fails to use the trick on Watto.
Han And Chewie Are Reunited In Jabba’s Prison Cell
Following the downer ending of The Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi opens with the Rebels infiltrating Jabba the Hutt’s palace one by one in an attempt to save Han Solo from his carbonite freezing. Leia succeeds in unfreezing him, but they’re captured before they can escape.
Han is thrown in Jabba’s resident prison cell with one of the other heroes who tried to save him – his trusty Wookiee sidekick Chewbacca – who warmly embraces him. This reunion of one of Star Wars’ most beloved friendships never fails to tug on fans’ heartstrings.
Obi-Wan Leaves Baby Luke With Uncle Owen And Aunt Beru
The final montage in Revenge of the Sith sets up the characters’ starting places in the original trilogy with a few key scenes. The last one sees Obi-Wan bringing an infant Luke to the Tatooine moisture farm where Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru will raise him as their own.
As Obi-Wan departs to find his own hiding spot, Owen and Beru hold their new adopted son and gaze out at Tatooine’s binary sunset. This moment has a beautiful parallel with Luke himself watching the same sunset from the same spot in the 1977 original.
The Mandalorian Slays A Krayt Dragon
It’s tricky to depict Tatooine in current Star Wars media, because the writers have to find the right balance between evoking nostalgia and exploring uncharted territory. The Mandalorian creator Jon Favreau managed this brilliantly with the season 2 premiere “Chapter 9: The Marshal.”
The episode brought the krayt dragon teased in the original movie to life. Mando teams up with Cobb Vanth and a band of Tusken Raiders to vanquish a krayt dragon that’s been terrorizing a Tatooine neighborhood. The climactic set-piece doesn’t feel like a TV action sequence at all; it wouldn’t be out of place on the big screen.
Greedo Confronts Han Solo In Mos Eisley Cantina
Just as Han is about to leave Mos Eisley Cantina, he’s confronted by Greedo. A bounty hunter holding a cool-as-ice cowboy at gunpoint in a shady saloon is ripped straight from a classic western, bringing yet another genre into the cocktail of influences that makes up Star Wars.
The only downside to this scene is that it was butchered in George Lucas’ “Special Edition.” Lucas added a quick shot from Greedo’s blaster before Han’s goes off, insinuating that Greedo shot first and Han only won the duel because his opponent happened to miss from point-blank range. But Han and Greedo’s quippy back-and-forth remained intact.
Anakin Wins The Boonta Eve Classic
Although The Phantom Menace was wildly polarizing when it first hit theaters, a few aspects of the movie are universally praised, like Darth Maul’s terrifying presence, Ewan McGregor’s turn as a young Obi-Wan, and of course, the nail-biting podracing sequence.
Sebulba’s attempts to sabotage Anakin’s pod raise the stakes of this set-piece beyond the obvious stakes of 700km/h pods speeding through narrow caverns, bumping into each other.
Jabba The Hutt Sacrifices The Rebels To The Sarlacc Pit
After the Rebels’ unsuccessful attempts to save Han at the beginning of Return of the Jedi, Jabba flies them all out to the middle of the desert so he can sacrifice them to the Sarlacc Pit for his own amusement. The Sarlacc is one of the Star Wars universe’s most memorable monsters.
According to the titling of John Williams’ score, this scene marks the titular “return of the Jedi” as Artoo tosses Luke his lightsaber while he’s walking the plank and he uses his newfound Jedi powers to turn the tables on Jabba’s criminal enterprise.
Luke Skywalker Watches The Binary Sunset
Without a doubt, the most memorable and iconic Star Wars scene to take place on Tatooine is when Luke watches the binary sunset in the original movie. Paired with Williams’ awe-inspiring “Force Theme,” this is a truly cinematic moment.
Luke watching the twin suns set over his mundane life, dreaming of leaving his dusty homeworld behind and joining the Rebellion, perfectly sums up the optimistic viewpoint of Lucas’ saga.